


Nothing More Than Half a Man

by BrainlessGenius



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Body Modification, Deceit | Janus Sanders is a Good Friend, Deceit | Janus Sanders is a Little Shit, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Frog Morality | Patton Sanders, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Touch Starvation, M/M, Morality | Patton Sanders Angst, Morality | Patton Sanders Is Not Okay, Morality | Patton Sanders Needs a Hug, One Shot, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Prompt Fill, Self-Doubt, but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:08:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29584914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrainlessGenius/pseuds/BrainlessGenius
Summary: After the events of SVSR Patton finds a patch of frog skin still coating his shoulder. With the mindscape in shambles after the chaos that ensued during the wedding, Patton thinks the best thing would be to not add any more to this hot pot of issues and hide it.And Janus? Janus isn't amused in the slightest.A fill for the prompt request "Patton getting permanent frog traits"
Relationships: Deceit | Janus Sanders & Morality | Patton Sanders, Deceit | Janus Sanders/Morality | Patton Sanders
Comments: 10
Kudos: 109





	Nothing More Than Half a Man

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [i feel stupid, ugly (pretend it doesn’t bother me)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26241454) by [remy_the_lemon_berry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/remy_the_lemon_berry/pseuds/remy_the_lemon_berry). 



> **Warning/s:** Self-doubt, self-deprecation, guilt, slight body horror??
> 
> This is heavily, heavily inspired by a fic made by a good friend of mine. Anon’s prompt is actually kinda the plot of [@remy-the-lemon-berry](https://remy-the-lemon-berry.tumblr.com/)’s [i feel stupid, ugly (pretend it doesn’t bother me)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26241454/chapters/63872473) but I asked it permission and now I got to have my own fun and put my own cute lil spin on it :))

Quite honestly, even Patton himself has no idea where that came from.

It was obvious that the others were shocked. Who wouldn’t be after seeing someone you know turn into a gigantic frog out of desperate rage? But Patton was just as startled as they were, just as confused, just as unsure as to how exactly he managed to turn into one of those silly, slimy little critters.

The whole memory was hazy; like he was stuck in green apple cotton candy. Everything felt weird, too. He could feel the words coming out of his mouth and knew what he was saying. But at the same time his body felt like it wasn’t his, like he was controlling a shell more than he was controlling himself.

Patton thought that after that incident, that was that. He thought that maybe he can forget that whole hopping madness and focus on making amends to his little decisional mishap (and maybe fix things with the other sides too).

Yet just hours after he left Janus to be with Thomas, just as he was getting ready for bed, something caught his eye. He walked closer to his dresser’s mirror, shirt only half-off his torso. Something green peeked through the collar of his polo. He quickly shucked the rest of the garment off, eyes widening as he stood bare-chested by the mirror.

Frog skin. Green, smooth, slippery frog skin covering a patch on his right shoulder. 

His breath hitched at the sight of it, fingers trembling while he traced the inhuman skin extending down to his right chest; stopping short of where his heart would be. The sight sickened him and fired question after question in his still mushy head. Confusion tempted him to stay there just staring at his reflection, left to wonder all night why in tarnation a part of him was still left in such a way. 

But he was tired as heck after the day’s events, and Patton only wanted some sleep.

So he quickly put on a loose tee and changed into some pajama bottoms, hiding the abnormal piece of skin from his eyes. He settled into bed and tried to forget the horrifying reminder of his mistake branded on his shoulder. He thought maybe it was only a remnant of whatever in the heavens happened a while ago, and that tomorrow it would be gone.

He went to sleep with a smile plastered on his face and a heart hopeful to leave this behind him and start a new day.

Unfortunately even the “nicest” side in the mindscape can’t always have nice things. He’s genuinely forgotten about the mark when he wakes, which makes the surprise even stronger when he begins to change into his signature attire afterwards. He doesn’t know what to think when he sees the green tinge in contrast to his skin still there, but right now he has no time to think of it.

He slaps on a shirt, shivering slightly when the clothing feels wrong on his amphibian skin, and finishes his look with a sparkling smile. 

It’s awfully quiet when he comes out of his room. He expected Logan to be out in the dining room, at least, sipping on coffee and doing work or a crossword. Instead there’s no one. Just him, the emptiness of the kitchen, and the discomfort of his own skin. 

Then Patton remembers how Logan left them yesterday in… more than a sour mood, just fresh from having been replaced by Janus, and suddenly it makes sense why he’s alone right now in the commons.

As he cracks another egg into the pan his mind flits through multiple things at once. He thinks of Janus and his arguments, of how he fought strongly for the callback and how he shared his name. He thinks of Roman and how confused and devastated he felt the previous day, how he made fun of Janus’ name and sunk out with a dismissal of Patton’s reassurance. He thinks of the itching of his chest and shoulder, and how he shouldn’t be scratching it lest he wants the eggs specialized with frog flavoring.

The yolk breaks in the last egg he cracks, yellow spilling into the pan and mixing with the white. No matter, he’ll just take the broken one.

Patton practically lights up when he hears footsteps approaching the common area just in time for him to put down the plate of breakfast on the table. The hour tells him it’s most probably Roman or Logan, or maybe even Remus knowing how unpredictable the side is. Then someone in a purple hoodie and messy hair comes into view, catching Patton by surprise.

Patton instinctively smiles and greets Virgil who is still rubbing at his eyes and fighting off a yawn. “Oh! Good morning, kiddo!”

Virgil loses the fight and gives in to a yawn. He tosses Patton a single wave and walks past him, heading straight for the fridge for a carton of milk. “Surprised, padre? Yeah, me too.” Once he has his glass he sits on the dining table. Patton chooses not to tell him to sit on a proper chair for now. 

The moral side takes a seat, too. Grateful for whoever’s company he can have in such an unusually quiet mindscape. “I don’t mind it at all! But is there a reason why you’re up so early? Or well, uhm, early for you, at least?”

Virgil scoffs once, legs swinging slightly and corner of his mouth twitching up. “Believe me, I wouldn’t wake up until later if I could.” He sips. “But eh, overtime is a pain in the ass. Couldn’t sleep. Thomas has been a hell of a lot more anxious lately.” He pauses to look to the hallway and Patton follows his line of sight. “Especially after that hell-show you guys pulled yesterday.” 

Virgil looks back to Patton, expression downgrading to a neutral line and half-lidded eyes. “So, Deceit told you his name, huh?”

A twinge of guilt worms its way to Patton’s chest and he strongly fights the urge to scratch his shoulder. “Yeah, he did. Listen, about that, Virge--”

Virgil waves his hand in dismissal. “I don’t wanna hear it. I may not be on the best terms with him and the trash-rat right now but I’m sure there’s a reason for all this. I was listening the entire time. The snake... had some real solid points there, not gonna lie. It’s still pretty crappy of him to do Roman in like that but then again--” he shrugs and makes a face. “-- making fun of the guy’s name wasn’t exactly the best thing to do either, was it?”

Patton sighs as the raw memories of the day before hits him in a strong wave. “Yeah. I don’t know what to do about it, either.” Patton rubs his palms under his glasses and over his eyes, a small groan escaping him. “I haven’t even checked in on Roman yet--”

Virgil straightens, hand growing tighter on his glass. “I uh… I’ve actually talked to Princey--”

Patton swiftly shoots his head up at Virgil. “You did? What’d he say? How is he--?”

Virgil leans back a bit at the sudden energy from Patton and Pat calms down a bit in realization. “Uhm, I think it’s best if you just… leave him for now. He’s not exactly too uh… _keen_ on seeing anyone else right now, so--”

“Oh.” Patton’s face drops and his gaze comes down along with it. The guilt eats at him stronger but he pushes it down for now as he unconsciously tunes into how Virgil’s fingers are tapping nervously at the glass. “I... I understand, kiddo. If Roman needs some him-time then that’s all good. Make sure he’s alright for me, hmm?”

Virgil can’t quite meet his gaze but he nods. “Sure thing, padre. I’ll keep him company for ya.”

Patton sends him a small smile even when the silence after that is a bit too uncomfortable, a bit too loud for both of their tastes. It feels like there’s fog all over the mindscape, and just breathing is enough to kinda suffocate you.

Then just as Virgil is about to hop off in an attempt to escape the unbearable silence, his eyes lock on Patton’s shirt, brows furrowing and mouth falling open marginally. “Pat? Why is your shirt wet?”

Patton looks down at Virgil’s question and sure enough he’s right. Nervousness blankets him at record speed. He blanches and shifts so that the cardigan slung around him falls in front of the stain. A smile reflexively grazes his face and an excuse is made on the spot. “Oh, this was just your silly Pops spilling some juice a while ago.” He nervously chuckles, wiping at the stain with his cardigan and stifling a gasp at the irritating way the actions rubbed against the unfamiliar skin. “You know how clumsy I am--”

Virgil’s features scrunch up in questioning even further. “But I didn’t see that there a while ago--”

“It must have just uh, been covered up by the cardigan. _Pretty_ sure it’s been there for a while, Virge.” He takes off his glasses as a desperate shot at shifting the point. “Maybe you need to borrow my glasses, kiddo. Looks like your eyesight isn’t 20/20 anymore from how much you’ve been _stain_ awake--”

Virgil groans at his sorry attempt of a joke. “Pat, that was terrible. You’ve done better.”

“Yeah, well,” Patton stands and puts the chair back in its place, already inching back towards the hallway. “Every dog has its day, Virge.”

“That’s… that’s still not what that means, uhm--”

He talks louder as he retreats further into the hallway. “I’m just gonna go ahead and change into something less wet! There’s eggs on the table if ever anyone wants them!” He speed-walks out of the dining area, leaving a confused Virgil behind.

In his room, Patton releases a breath. The itching becomes unthinkable so the ruined shirt is immediately tossed away. He runs a finger through the frog skin which has begun to creep down onto his right upper arm. Slime coats his fingers once he takes them away and he grimaces at its icky consistency.

A shuddering sigh resounds as he steps in front of his mirror yet again, helpless and clueless to why this is happening and how this can end. But that’s the thing, though. He doesn’t have all the answers yet. Not even a single one. But with so much ruckus and tension right now in the mindscape, this unfortunate thing happening to him seems like the least of their concerns.

No one else should know about this. Not while everyone is still walking such a fragile tightrope. So for now, Patton will just have to hide it and hope for the best. He holds onto the itsy-bitsiest thread of hope that this peculiar little defect will eventually go away, and until then he can always just carry on with what he usually does.

He achieves his little hiding trick with bandages and gauze to seep up the secreted mucus. For a while it works. It does the trick and Patton goes back to making sure everything is ship-shape in the dusty old scape. 

Well… it doesn’t exactly go too well. 

Logan still refuses to meet them. He spends most of his time cooped up in his room and probably only ever goes out when no one else is around. Patton has certainly tried getting to Roman through any way he can to maybe at least apologize. He still hasn’t gotten to. Virgil is doing better with Roman than Patton ever will, which should be a good thing but it doesn’t really feel like it. Remus is still… Remus, as far as the side goes. And Janus--

Janus is _different._

The others seem to have retreated into worlds of their own, content in their own bubble where no one else gets to enter; safe from any stinging reminder of previous events and opportunities at conflict. Janus is a break in that system, being the only side recently who willingly ventures out of his room other than Patton. 

And Patton has always known Janus to be someone daring enough to shatter conventions, but he’s never appreciated his doing so this much.

In a mindscape where no one dares to cut through their radio silence, Janus’s minimal noise is like a refreshing drink. And whether he chalks it up to him being part amphibian currently, the weather, or the unbearableness of the wordless scene, Patton always seems to be thirsty, nowadays.

“I _won’t_ figure it out eventually, you know?” Janus says once while he watches Patton decorate this freshly-baked batch of cookies with smileys. It’s another of his pursuits at getting the others out of their rooms, of getting them all together, of getting them to at least _say something._ At least there’s still one of them.

“Figure out what?”

Janus’s fingers tap rhythmically on the counter. “What you’ve been hiding.”

The piping bag stops in the air, butchering one of the icing smileys on the tray. The sentence is too effective at catching Patton off-guard, and he knows he’s already too obvious before he can even think of whipping up an excuse.

“Hiding? Why, I’m as open as a cornfield in the middle of nowhere.”

Janus chuckles lowly. Patton hates to admit that the sound sends anxious shivers down his now slime-coated back. “Oh yes, as open as a cornfield.” He looks to his gloves, inspecting the yellow fabric while he holds his hand at eye-level. “Except the cornfield has a large, opaque dome over it complete with an entire militia standing guard.”

Patton gulps. He tries to wrack his mind for anything to reply to that attack, but finds none. He’s left to do nothing else but avoid Janus’s gaze and continue his piping despite the slightly ruined design on one of the snacks.

From the corner of his eye he sees Janus raising a brow while he picks up one of the finished cookies. “Ah, so you’re choosing the non-verbal route, too. Not gonna say anything.” He takes a bite out of the treat, head tilting once and mouth pursing out of unexpected satisfaction. “I suppose that’s fair. You’re just like the others. Just as afraid of confrontation as they are.”

Patton finishes piping the last one, settling down the bag on the counter a bit more roughly than he anticipated. “Is this the only reason you’ve been out of your room with me? To get an answer?”

He expects the same freezing effect on Janus to occur, yet the other only rolls his eyes. “Don’t think I know what you’re trying to do. You’re evading the topic. But alright.” He finishes the rest of his cookie, chewing and swallowing before he answers Patton. 

“Yes. I _don’t_ enjoy your company, Patton. I hope you heard the sarcasm in that ‘cause I wouldn’t be bothering explaining things right now if that was genuine. I’ve been going out of my room because unlike the rest of them, I’m not choosing to pretend like there isn’t a massive guillotine hanging right above our heads. Unlike them, I’m actually trying to do something about this. And every time I see you out here too I think you’re different. I think ‘oh, this is someone who’s _not_ going to walk around the problem like it’s an infinite game of Ring Around the Rosies’. But then I realize I’m wrong.” There’s a harsh spike of something from Janus’s voice, potent enough that Patton looks at him directly only to see narrowed eyes and thinned lips. 

But then the expression leaves, replaced by an odd sense of dejection manifested through a quick exhale and side glancing eyes. “Well, at least you aren’t Roman. At least you’re just not saying things and not blatantly lying.” Janus snaps his head slightly to look at him, a mellowed ferocity returning in his features. “There, I answered your question. I think it’s only just that you answer mine, don’t you think? So, what _have_ you been hiding, Patton?”

His heart starts racing, its beats thrumming loudly in his ears. It feels like Janus is staring straight into his soul and Patton is being glitter-glued right there on his spot. The non-human part of him starts itching. The sudden consciousness of its presence makes it too heavy all over his gauze-covered chest, shoulder, and back.

Janus takes just a single step closer. Patton unconsciously takes a step back, but his hip is already hitting the edge of the counter and his feet have no more left to trek. Unconsciously he holds a breath as Deceit’s eyes narrow further, body leaning towards him dangerously slow--

“Double D! There you are!”

The sound of Remus’s booming voice breaks Janus’s focus and Patton sees his way out. He quickly ducks and sprints away, his right side bumping into the duke as he zooms by. In the hallway, Patton hears the vague voice of Remus asking what’s wrong with him. So he lingers just in front of his door for a while longer, waiting to see if Janus will reply.

He doesn’t, and Patton enters. 

He enters just in time to feel another annoying wave of itching strike his neck, shoulders, chest, back, and face. Just in time to feel another burst of discomfort crawl through his skin, fingers clawing and scratching at whatever part of his right side he can reach. The shirt and cardigan are practically torn off with a desperate groan, and his clumsy feet take him directly towards the mirror. There’s already a dip in the carpet in front of his dresser, already too many smudges on the reflective glass, too many pieces of damp gauze piling in the bin.

A choked gasp resounds through the room as he unfurls the bandages sheet by sheet. He looks with helplessness at how the frog skin now breaches his full right arm, just shyly touching the back of his hand. There’s even a bit creeping up his neck, yellowish-green and still revolting as ever. He wants to crash to the floor then and there, but he stops himself. Not yet. Maybe he can still wait. Maybe it can still be fixed.

Muscle memory brings Patton to his shower, scowling at every run of his soap-lathered hand through his anomalous right side but refreshed at every splash of water to his needy, amphibian skin. As the near-scalding water grazes his body, his thoughts wander. 

He has yet to think of a way to hide this, now that a shirt won’t quite do the trick anymore. The cardigan is the first obvious bet, but it would be too suspicious, wouldn’t it? He never actually wears the thing, and it’s nowhere near autumn for him to be passing the blame to cold weather. Bandages would just look ridiculous and would make absolutely no sense at all. A turtleneck and long-sleeves would, though fashionable, would just not be him.

And, again, oddly suspicious and overall just a terrible idea.

Naturally, the still terrible but passable conclusion he arrives at is to stay in his room. The others are already avoiding each other anyway, and Janus probably wants nothing to do with Patton anymore after that little kerfuffle in the kitchen.

So he does exactly that. 

The changes seem to come about more rapidly now. He loses track of when exactly the skin hikes all the way up his face, glasses digging into the slimy flesh in a way too unlike the other half of his features. He doesn’t remember when his right eye turns into a horizontal slit, nor when his right fingers gain stickier finger pads. It’s an interesting thing to have when he’s used to combing through his hair with his bare hands, something he now needs to unlearn unless he wants to go bald earlier.

With every layer of mucus and unintentional croak from his throat he feels the sheer disgust and revulsion shake him like leaves in October. The sight alone is already enough to make him gag. Throw in the vile, foreign sensations of skin and features that were never there and it’s enough to get him sniffling miserably in bed cursing his pillows and the mirror for this unbearable experience. 

He thinks himself of a monster more often than he’d like. And he can’t even reprimand himself for it, either. It only takes one look at the uneven blotches on his leg and arm, the almost solid patch spanning his chest, the dark spot on his nostril, the horizontal slit of his right lips, the froggy sounds from his pipes, the stickiness in his fingers, and even the way he’s simultaneously craving for water on his parched skin and feeling like he’s drowning in too much of it. 

It only takes another sleepless night thinking about the stupid decision he forced on Thomas, another late hour spent missing the noise and warmth of the mindscape, another apology he can’t say, another regret he can’t take back, another mistake he can’t reverse. It only takes just one of those many reminders for Patton to look and feel like a monstrous creature.

But hey! There always has to be a positive side to everything. So he thanks his stuffy room that sides don’t actually need food to survive, that no one has seen him yet like this, that they don’t have to subject themselves to the monstrosity he’s become. And lastly, he thanks whoever is listening that he at the very least does not have webbed fingers or toes. He’s thankful for that much. There’s already too much wrong with him already.

Patton knows he can’t just stay in forever, even if no one is making any efforts to knock on his door or check up on him, either. He tries his absolute best to think logically, like what Logan does. It’d be much easier if his smart brain were here to think up a solution with him, he thinks. 

Patton then remembers how Janus isn’t the only side with the ability to shapeshift. They’ve done this before in the past, to help Thomas cope with the idea of being far from his friends, and honestly Patton feels a little silly for not thinking of this sooner. He concentrates real hard as he stands in front of the mirror again, only opening his eyes once he feels how the skin on his right has shifted, and how he feels just the tiniest bit less icky.

He looks, and he sees… him. He sees Morality. Bare-chested, a bit chilly, and ogling like a child, but human. He still doesn’t feel human, unfortunately. It is just in a way an illusion after all, and he’s still very much half-frogger under this temporary game of dress-up. But it’s a solution and it’ll have to work. 

It’s only about fifteen minutes into his disguise that he recalls why exactly the others don’t do this as much as Janus does. He remembers how all four of them basically crashed into the commons like limp noodles once they sunk out from that whole shape-shifting fiasco, without an ounce of energy to even get up from where they lay like pancakes on top and across each other.

That’s exactly what’s happening now, with Patton face-down on his carpet, slime seeping into its tufts, breath heaving from unpracticed effort. It’s pretty pathetic that he only lasted that long, no doubt from a lack of use of this ability.

Yet once again the universe decides to punish Patton even more, ‘cause not even seconds after he falls flat on his stomach onto his poor, unsuspecting floor, there’s a knock on his door. Perhaps even the first knock he’s heard in days. Or weeks. Or something in between. Aw heck, who keeps count?

With a groan bordering on a sob (and a croak too but he’ll dismiss that), he hauls himself up. He yanks the shirt from where it landed somewhere on the bed, clearing his throat while he mentally prepares himself to either shoo this person away or spend the last of his energy to put on the disguise yet again.

He forces a smile on and the signature hype in his tone. “Who is it?”

There’s a few awkward moments of silence, and then a voice. “It’s uhm… it’s Roman.” 

Patton thought his neck would break from the speed he looked to his door. The voice sounded dejected, down, and like someone who wasn’t allowed any ice cream, but still undeniably, indubiously Roman. It’s the first he’s heard from him in so long, and he definitely doesn’t want to waste this only chance he might have at offering an apology, at talking, or even just listening to him.

“Roman! Just a minute!” He closes his eyes tight and stops a whine from himself as he forces human skin, eyes, nostrils, and lips to manifest again. He already feels the exhaustion once it’s on, but a few shakes and skips will fix that. The shirt is put on in a breath and his feet are by the door in a jiff.

He turns the doorknob and… it’s not Roman.

“Janus?”

Janus almost looks shameful in front of him, but the pride is still very much there in the way he stands straight, face shifting only minimally, feet planted firmly on the ground. “For the record, I’m not too proud of what I just did and I’m sorry. But I thought that was probably the only way I could ascertain you opening the door for me.”

Patton stares at him, not exactly sure what to feel. There’s a slight betrayal there, but also relief, yet there’s also irritation, sadness, but somehow also joy and there’s of course the tiredness from keeping face but-- right. He has to talk. Right.

“Where’s Roman?”

Janus winces almost unnoticeably, though Patton thinks it’s how the snake half of Jan’s face twitches that gives him away. “Up and running, being himself in the commons, not still refusing to talk to me or you or Logan or his twin at _all--_ ”

Patton’s face falls. “So still not talking. Got it.”

Janus wrings his hand together, a motion more befitting Virgil than it should Janus, in Patton’s head. “Well, you’re still your own individual, this is still your room, and I can’t force you to do anything. So if you want me to leave right now then just say the word.”

And Patton almost does. Almost. But there’s another part of him that’s stopping him, and apparently the internal quarrel is already too time-consuming to bear results. 

Janus clasps his hands together and smirks. “You didn’t say anything, therefore, you’re not asking me to leave, ergo, I’m entering. Thank you for _such_ hospitality, Patton.” Janus steps inside and even has the audacity to be the one to close the door behind him. He strides over to the center of the room and looks around.

Patton internally shakes off the wooziness he feels and turns to speak. “What are you doing here, Jan?”

Janus snaps to turn his head towards Patton, arms flinging out to flourish and fingers animating as he answers. “Oh, the usual. Checking up on the sides, ensuring you’re still doing your jobs, making sure you folks are still alive, talking, not being a coward.” He sits on the bed, eyes and slightly condescending expression still directed towards Patton. “You know, what everyone stopped doing since the wedding.”

Patton has yet to understand why Janus always seems to have daggers in his words.

He takes a seat on the same bed. He pulls his feet up out of habit, cross-legged; while Janus keeps his feet still on the ground, shoes digging into the carpet below. Patton faces Janus and shifts up his shoulders. “So? I’m here now. I’m talking.”

Janus furrows his brows at him, but the pursed smirk stays on. “My, is that snark coming from you? Oh, you must be so agitated to lose all that pep in your lovely little voice.” 

Janus isn’t necessarily wrong. All the effort it’s taking to keep up his act is weighing down on him that he can barely pay attention to what the other is saying and doing. But he is still Morality, and that was very untoward of him. He fixes it after a sigh and a hand, the non-sticky one, through his hair. “Sorry, Jan. I didn’t mean that. Maybe just a little tired--”

Janus swiftly turns his body to face Patton more. “No, no, don’t apologize. This is great, actually. You’re finally loosening up.” The smirk makes it hard for Patton to identify whether it’s genuity he hears in Janus’s voice or sarcasm. He thinks it’s both equally likely. “You even admitted for once that you’re exhausted.” 

He inhales sharply. Frick. Why had he let that slip through? His freezing up only spurs Janus on even more. “So why is that, hmm? Why are you exhausted when you haven’t even been leaving your room ever since… oh, you know since when.”

Patton turns his gaze away, arms coming up reflexively to hug himself. He doesn’t really have half a mind to think of his next answers. “Janus can’t we just--” he huffs and drops his arms. “--can’t we just leave this alone? I swear from tomorrow I’ll go back to my old routine and then we can try wrangling the others together too--”

Janus rolls his eyes along with his head in a very exaggerated manner while a dragged out groan sounds from his throat. “Ugh, _here_ we go again!” His palms rub at his face frustratedly. “This is exactly what all of you do! Logan doesn’t give me any proper answers, Virgil just slams the door at my face, Roman won’t even talk, Remus is still the most chaotic bastard I’ve met, and then here you are, worse than where you started off!”

Janus stands and Patton is grateful for the larger proximity between them. It gives him a bit of time to breathe through his tiring illusion. “Do you think I don’t feel it? Do you think this whole disaster isn’t driving me insane? There’s a lie of commission here, a lie of omission there, lies, lies, just--” his arms fly outwards in disgruntlement. “ _\--lies everywhere!_ ”

He moves closer again but is still standing in front of Patton who is just trying his best not to faint on the spot. “Don’t you want all of this to be over and done with, Patton? ‘Cause I sure as hell can’t stand all the deception constantly punching my senses in the face anymore.”

Patton tamps down an exhausted grunt. “Then why are you coming to me?”

Janus looks terribly unamused, and honestly just as fatigued as Patton is. “Because you’re the biggest liar of them all. And I thought you were supposed to be Morality?”

The disguise almost dies down right then and there, yet Patton manages to force it to stay still even when alarms were blaring in his head. “I-- I don’t know what you’re talking about, Jan--”

His face shifts, a bit of softness still laced with agitation making itself known. “Pat-- please. I’m tired. I’m sure you are too. Absolutely no one at all is budging, and I’m desperate to have at least just one of you stop this ridiculous pretense. I know I’m not exactly the most trust-worthy person in the mindscape but--” Janus steps closer, leaning down to stare his moral counterpart in the eye. “-- you can talk to me. If you need me to not say a word to anyone then I won’t. If you want me to smack sense into you, I will. If you need to just yell it out and want me to pretend like I heard nothing then that’s a piece of cake.”

Patton wants to let go of his illusion so bad, even more so now that Janus’s presence is suddenly not as menacing as he’d imagined. “Just… just say something. Please,” Janus whispers, looking as if he is carrying so much of the world’s pain on his shoulders.

“Is there anything you want me to--” _croak_ “--say?”

A hand swiftly flies to Patton’s mouth while his eyes widen in stupid realization. His disguise is slipping, and the unmistakable inhuman sound that he just let out was too loud not to be noticed. Janus raises a brow, leaning back reflexively as he processes what he just heard.

“What was that?” he asks, sheer confusion evident on his face. Patton thinks it’s only right that Janus is leaning away from something horrific like him.

Patton straightens up, hands back down and eyes wide. “What was what?”

“That sound. It sounded like a croak.”

Pat’s hand goes flying out as his face twists into a fake disbelieving expression. “A croak? Well that can’t be right. Last time I checked I was still alive--!” He gasps as Janus catches his wrist mid-air, both human and snake eyes wide as he stares at Morality’s arm.

When Patton follows his line of sight, he figures out why. More of his hold slipped further, and there on his arm now lies the same sickly green tinge he’s seen every single day. 

“Pat, what--”

Out of panic he messily conjures the fallen bit of his disguise back up with a small squeak. His arm goes back to it’s normal cream-colored state quickly and he twists his wrist out of Janus’s hold, breathing raggedly.

Seriousness coats Janus’s face, a renewed sense of urgency swimming in his eyes. “Patton, what did I just see? What was that on your arm?”

He chuckles nervously, left hand rubbing at his right wrist while he squeezes in a smile through the strong fatigue coursing through him. “I-It was nothing, Jan--!”

Janus clicks his tongue in distaste. “Lie.” He then goes to sit back down on the bed next to Patton, grabbing both of the moral side’s wrists in either gloved hands. His grip is gentle but still strong, much how his gaze is right now.

In front of Deceit, Patton feels the trickery dangerously slipping. A quiet groan escapes him as a surge of shallow pain bites him from the appearance he’s pulling up. Janus takes notice of this and his face shifts in alarm, seemingly vaguely aware of what’s happening. “Patton, whatever you’re doing right now, stop it.” He tugs on Patton’s wrists a bit swiftly, and for a second the room dissolves in swirls along with a split second of green rippling across his skin. Janus’s voice grows more frantic. “Pat, you’re not built for this. You’ll end up hurting yourself. Let go of it. Stop it _now._ ”

Patton breathes heavily through gritted teeth once. Twice. Thrice. More and more of his hold on the illusion slips away like kinetic sand on his open palm and the ache in his muscles grow worse and worse by the second. He looks at the seriousness in Janus’s one eye and the pure concern in the other.

Then suddenly the reigns fall from his grasp at last. With an exhausted moan he slumps heavily towards Janus’s waiting arms, planting his face unceremoniously against the crook of the other’s neck. He feels his amphibian features return, and through the fog in his terribly, _terribly_ tired mind he swears he feels Janus shudder against him.

Of course he would.

“Aw, Patton…” he hears Janus say. There’s a gloved hand patting gently at his hair as he continues to catch his breath. Then he’s being pulled closer. He whines softly at the oddly discomforting relief of having someone other than him run a hand across his unnaturally smooth back. He’s waiting for Janus to pull away, or to push him off of him, to look at him in utter horror or to revolt at the slight mucus seeping into his capelet.

But he doesn’t. He only lets Patton stay there to regain his strength, silent as opposed to the snappy deceitful side before him just minutes ago. Patton can’t even bring himself to let go; not because of the overwhelming comfort Janus’ embrace is giving him, but because of the immense fear keeping him from showing his half-froggy face.

“Is this what you’ve been hiding, hmm?” Janus asks. 

Patton nods and hums against the capelet, wincing when the sound that comes out is more like a frog’s rumble than a human’s.

“I appreciate the honesty that time. Been a while since I’ve tasted one of those. Do you plan on staying there forever?”

Patton mumbles, face still flush against Deceit’s shoulders. “Can I?”

Janus laughs once. “As much as I don’t mind you using me as a shield and a pillow all at once, you _are_ going to have to eventually show yourself to the others.” Janus’s hands stop at his shoulders, pulling away by the smallest fraction but still keeping him there. “Why not start with me?”

Despite the deep shame and disgust coursing through him, Janus is still right. He always is. So he slowly pulls away, making a face at the very thin string of mucus that connects Janus’s capelet to his right cheek. He runs his hand through the string with a small squeal to get rid of it, earning a small huff of amusement from the other. “Don’t worry it’ll come off.”

Pat breaths nervously but then his right hand lands on the capelet, too, and they both make a clumsy show out of dislodging Pat’s fingers from the fabric. With maybe a few sighs and anxious chuckles in between.

Patton cannot look Janus in the eye, feeling too painfully aware of how he looks right now, his secret laid out in the open for the other to see.

“Since when?” Janus asks.

He keeps his head down. “Since the wedding--”

Out of the corner of his frog eye he sees Janus wince. “That is an excruciatingly long time to be hiding something as big as this, Patton. No wonder I couldn’t sleep--”

Patton winces too, shoulders still slumped in shame. “Yeah, sorry about that. It’s just that… everyone’s been going through such a rough patch since that day. Me turning into a hideous human-frog hybrid just seemed like the least concerning thing at the time--”

Janus holds a hand in front of him abruptly, tutting at Patton. “Did I just hear you say ‘ _hideous’_?”

Ah, darn. Caught again. He really isn’t great at this whole hiding thing, is he?

Janus shuffles even closer on the bed, arms, hands, and fingers back at it with animatedly expressing what he’s trying to say. “You know what? Fine. You hiding it for that long is… somehow valid. It was your first time, you were most likely terrified and confused out of your mind, and you aren’t exactly known to have the best sense of judgement--”

Patton feigns offense. “Ow?”

Janus opens and closes his mouth sheepishly, hands still awkwardly in the air. “Oh, uh, sorry. My point is that I can dismiss all of that, but I am definitely not letting you off the hook for the whole ‘hideous’ thing.”

Patton knits his brows together, questioningly looking up at Janus and waiting for him to carry on. 

“Patton, you are a lot of things. You’re… ridiculously silly, childish even. You like to think you’re morally white but I digress. You shift into the gray zone more than you care to admit but well--” he smiles and waves a hand in dismissal, “--that’s a conversation for another day. Your decision making skills need work, that’s for sure. You’re also too emotional for your own good. Then again you _are_ Thomas’s feelings so I suppose I can’t blame you for that one--”

“Jan-- where are you even going with this?”

Janus mischievously but bashfully smiles. “Right, of course. Got a bit carried away there but yes. You are all of those things and so much more, Patton.” Then Janus holds his gaze. Patton doesn’t notice when he holds his breath. “But you are not hideous. Not monstrous. Not before this whole wedding-callback crime and not now that you’re practically half frog in front of me.”

Then Janus gestures to himself. “I mean, I’ve been doing this whole half-human half-not thing for the entirety of my existence, Patton. If you think of _me_ as a macabre, odious, revolting beast too then I’ll let you rest your case--”

Patton’s eyes grow wide. “No! Never! I’ve never thought of you in that way and you can trust me on that. That’s the truth.”

Janus smirks fondly. “I know. I can feel it, remember?”

“Oh.” Patton nods, feeling laughable but also warm at the same time. “Right.”

Then Janus breathes deep, and Patton watches. He extends a gloved-covered hand in front of him, features growing soft. Morality keeps his gaze on the other while Janus tucks a stray piece of hair behind Patton’s green-splotched ear. “If you don’t think of me as such, then why must you think it of yourself?”

Patton shudders into Janus’s feathery-light touch while a subtly pained expression mars his face. “‘Cause it isn’t just about the outside, is it?” 

Janus is smart. Patton knows that. Especially now with how Janus is looking at him with stitched up brows and slightly parted lips, hand still lightly resting by Patton’s right temple. He’s caught Patton’s drift. Patton doesn’t even need to elaborate further how he thinks he’s the main culprit for this entire mess with Thomas, with the other sides. He doesn’t need to tell Janus that he’s hurt Thomas and the others far too greatly. Doesn’t need to tell him that he’s just as much of a beast inside than he is outside.

And Janus knows this. Of course he does. He’s smart and Patton has always loved that about him.

Janus doesn’t say anything. Not yet, maybe. But he does scooch over a bit awkwardly until his back is hitting the bed’s headboard. Then he lightly pulls at Patton’s sleeve, kind of like a toddler asking for a treat, quite honestly. 

“Come here,” he whispers, and Patton obliges. What else is there to do anyway?

So Patton settles beside Janus, and without warning he’s being pulled closer to the half-reptilian facet. He’s maneuvered (though more than half of him follows willingly) to nestle his left side flush against Janus’s right, both their human halves in contact, exchanging assuaging warmth between their two bodies. Deceit keeps his arm around Patton’s form, pressing him even closer, and Morality lets his head fall to Janus’s shoulder.

This might just be the most human contact Patton has received in so long, starving him of those gigantic hugs he’s always loved giving and the cuddle piles he’s so fervently initiated before everything turned to madness. He might have sighed and almost sobbed at the enveloping embrace, but Janus keeps quiet about it, thankfully.

Janus rubs a tentative hand up and down Patton’s sleeve in a comforting manner. The latter hears the audible gulp coming from the former. “You’ve made a couple of mistakes, Patton. I did too. The rest of them did, as well. And you might think that you’ve played the biggest part in the figurative fuck-up pie chart, and maybe you wouldn’t be wrong.”

The statement unconsciously gets a devastated Patton moving away but Janus gently tightens his hold, pulling him back into their warmth. Janus looks down at him and Patton’s teary human eye meets Janus’s. “But you’re trying. You’re learning. Your role… isn’t easy. Morality isn’t black and white, after all. But I’ve seen your efforts. You’re doing everything you can and you’re doing better. Who am I to say whether you still have a long way to go from here? But nonetheless, I’d still love to be right here beside you to see us _both_ improve.” Janus inhales and exhales. Patton mirrors the action unconsciously, their eyes still locked on each other. “And really, is it that monstrous of us to try and be better?”

The tear falls down Patton’s human cheek. “No. No it isn’t.”

Even though it comes off as a smirk, Patton knows it’s a genuine smile he sees on Janus’s lips. Deceit’s free hand comes to wipe off the moisture that rolled down Pat’s face and it gets Patton chuckling breathily. Even if just temporarily. 

“What if it’s permanent?” Patton asks. And yes, he knows there’s an underlying double meaning yet again to what he just said, but he trusts Janus enough to know it.

Janus hums and hugs him even tighter. “The sides? We’ll get there eventually. I don’t think this’ll last forever. There’s bound to be a breaking point somewhere. We’ll just hang on a little bit more. One person at a time, hmm?” Patton nods, but there’s still doubt heavy in his chest. 

Then Janus roams his eyes over the frog half of Patton’s face and arms, enough to brand a blush on his human side from painful abashment and fluster. “And if this version of you is here to stay, then I’ll be permanent, too. Maybe we can be just half-human together.” 

An obvious blush creeps on Janus, and he evades Patton’s fond gaze. He coughs and sputters. “And uh, well, they’ve handled one hybrid before and they can do it again. It’s not that hard. You’re definitely not a sight for sore eyes and if they can’t see that then well… they’re bitches.”

Patton laughs, even if Janus only burns a shade deeper beside him. 

The whole moment feels surreal, crazy. He’s snuggled up against one of the last sides he thought he’d ever even converse with, lapping up as much warmth as he can while they sit there content in each other’s embrace. It doesn’t feel real, doesn’t feel like he deserves these words or this treatment.

“Thank you, Janus,” Patton croaks out. Quite literally, much to his annoyance. He may not feel like his mistakes make him worthy of receiving such kindness, such affection, but it’s still the polite thing to do. His gratitude for this man right now is genuine, even when the fear in him is still to a degree just as real.

And Janus doesn’t reply anymore. He merely spares him a glance, smiles, and leans back once again, keeping both of them there. The first piece of peace before they surge into the storm once more, before they thread through the murkiest swamps and the driest deserts with nothing but each other to push them forward.

And somehow, that fact is enough for Patton. 

It’ll be alright.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you're all doing okay! Every little support and kudos is eternally appreciated. Follow me on Tumblr [@nerdy-emo-royal-dad](https://nerdy-emo-royal-dad.tumblr.com/)!. Stay safe, fams! <3


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